


I wanna be yours

by GubraithianFire



Series: You love love love when you know I can't love [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Teenagers, Angst, Domestic Violence, Happy Ending, Homophobic Language, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, POV John Watson, Panic Attacks, Teenlock, Unhealthy Relationships, rugby!john
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-07
Updated: 2015-04-07
Packaged: 2018-03-21 19:18:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3702861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GubraithianFire/pseuds/GubraithianFire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Secrets I have held in my heart</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Are harder to hide than I thought</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Maybe I just wanna be yours</i>
</p><p>John had him, John cradled him in his arms, John kissed him and fucked him and now Sherlock is gone.<br/>
It took him five bloody days to realise that he can’t live without Sherlock Holmes, that the air seems thicker and gravity stronger, pulling him down, down.<br/>
Sherlock was <i>there</i>, and he was <i>his</i>, and he loved him, he loved <i>John</i>, no matter how broken he was, Sherlock had loved him. But Sherlock saw him there with his mates, and he had looked at John with that expression. There was no love in it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I wanna be yours

**Author's Note:**

> I hate myself right now.  
> I HAD FINISHED THIS FIC THREE WEEKS AGO. But I wasn't happy with it, and I kept reading and reading it again, cutting scenes, changing the wording of a sentence here and there and _I'm still not satisfied_.  
>  Here it's passed midnight and I have to wake up at 6am for school but I need to post this now because even though I only needed three bus rides to school to write this, it has haunted my life for three weeks and I haven't written anything else, so I have to post this and go on with my life.  
> Moreover, lots of you had asked me for a sequel last time, and well, hope you appreciate the effort :)  
> Ugh, I'm rambling. Don't mind me, I overtalk when I'm sleepy. 
> 
> This is basically John's POV on some of the events of "I just want you to do me no good" and what happens after, plus some flashback on his shitty childhood (thank you Shameless for the inspiration). I'm not sure this can be read as a stand alone. 
> 
> Unbeta'd, all mistakes are mine. Please do point them out, either in the comments or on my [blog](http://caspu.tumblr.com/). It would be really helpful to me since I'm not a native speaker. 
> 
> Enjoy! :)

John locked the door of his room. He just heard his father coming back from the pub, his feet barely leaving the ground as he walked through the dark house. John listened carefully to the steps a few seconds longer, his heart beating incredibly fast. He let out a relieved breath when the sound didn’t stop in front of his room. John turned, ready to finally crawl into bed, when a noise made his blood run cold. A door slamming. But it was too close, too close, his father’s bedroom was upstairs, the noise had come from somewhere near... Harry’s room.

John ran to the door, cursing as his hands trembled too much to hold the damn key still, and Harry was screaming now, and John had to be there, had to go to his sister, had to-

The door finally unlocked and little later John was in Harry’s room, throwing his father off of his sister’s bed to punch him in the face. The man was even drunker than usual, if such a thing was possible, and it took John only a couple of blows on the temple to put him out. After living with the man for thirteen years, one learnt the basics.

Only when he was sure that his father really had fainted, John turned to his sister, noticing just then how much she was shaking. Her blouse was ripped, and she was sobbing hysterically. She was babbling something, but John couldn’t really make out the words. He cradled his twin sister in his arms.

“Come,” he said, leading her towards his bedroom, “We’ll sleep together tonight, I can lock us in.”

But she wouldn’t stop whispering those same words, and John still couldn’t understand them. He made her sit on his bed, then he locked his door again. He rummaged through his wardrobe, “Here,” he whispered, handing Harriet one of his old t-shirts, “Yours is ripped.”

Her words grew in volume then, becoming much clearer, and John desperately hoped he could go back, could pretend he didn’t know what she was saying.

“He thought I was mom. I’m not mom. He thought I was mom. John, oh God, John. He thought I was mom.”

 

 

John loves a good fight. He loves the adrenaline, loves that devastating wave of pure  _rage_  that blinds his mind. He loves to stop thinking, even if just for a few moments.

That’s why he’s actually secretly pleased when he’s in a pub and someone starts bothering him, because it means he has an excuse to fucking beat a bastard senseless.

That’s why, right now, he’s grinning in a cell inside the police station, his clothes blood-soaked wet.

 

 

He was enjoying a pint with his mates, when suddenly that idiot of O’Neill started to flirt with their bartender. It was fun at the beginning, but as the night drew on and they grew more and more tipsy, the girl started to feel uncomfortable, threatening to call the principal. John tried to stop O’Neill from shouting at the girl that she was just “a fucking prude” and that she could “call the Prime Minister” for all he cared. But John was slowed down by the alcohol flowing through his veins, and by the time he managed to slur the first word, the principal was already emerging from the back of the pub. The huge man was rolling his sleeves up, and John bit back the rest of his speech, already grinning in anticipation. He could envision the fight perfectly. As expected, O’Neill insulted the girl again, then the principal and his mother, gaining a punch right on the jaw. That was when John joined the fray, hitting with the intention to hurt, fighting as if his life depended on it. And in a way it kind of did. Because John wasn’t really kicking one of the bouncers’ stomach. He wasn’t really elbowing in the teeth the principal of the pub.

All he could see, among the red, hot edges around his vision, was his father’s face, getting the beating of his life. The beating that John could never give the bastard, who was too fucking strong for a seven year old boy who had the audacity to wear his sister’s pink shirt, because all the others were dirty.

Too strong for a nine year old boy who forgot to prepare dinner for everyone.

Too strong for a twelve year old boy whose only fault was to be home when his father came back, angrier than usual.

Too strong for an eighteen year old boy who stood up for his sister, because this time, he knew it, their father would kill her.

So John kicked and bit and punched and he didn’t even stop when the police arrived, and a damn cop told him that he’d have to take him in for violence towards a police officer, if he didn’t stop struggling. John just spat in the bastard’s face.

 

 

He folds his hands behind his head, staring at the ceiling of his cell. It’s not the first time he ends up in custody for the night, but his sister always manages to get him ou-

 _Fuck!_  John sits up with a movement so sudden he almost loses his balance on the narrow bench.

 

 

He hasn’t seen his sister for months, not since she had come out to the whole family and his father had almost broken her back with a chair. John stepped in for her, like he had done countless other times, getting the chair against his ribs and a couple of well assessed kicks on his right eye and cheekbone. But then he managed to shake his father off long enough to grab Harriet’s hand, and escape from the back door. Harry ran away as soon as they were out of the door, and John let her. It was normal, they would go to a friend for a couple of days, and then come back when their father forgot to even be mad. John thought that Harry was probably going to her girlfriend, the one he knew nothing about. Fine. What about him though? John had no one, literally. He couldn’t possibly go to any of his mates - if he did, they would have asked questions, questions he didn’t want to answer. They wouldn’t have understood. They’d have just made things worse, if such a thing was possible.

John hid in an alley not far from his house, thinking. Mary? No, Mary would never let him in, not at this time of the night, what with her mother always checking on her every half an hour after 1am. God, that woman was a psychopath. Who else? John realised with horror that the list was over. He only had Mary and his teammates. And Mary was a pitiful childhood friend, the others a bunch of idiots he didn’t even trust. John hit the back of his head against the wall, hard. He gritted his teeth, slamming his fists against the bricks behind his back. Because there  _was_  someone, someone he could go to, someone John already trusted, for some unfathomable reason. Someone who wouldn’t ask questions, because he would understand with a glance. Someone who would make an inappropriate joke, making the atmosphere ten times lighter. Someone whose eyes were the colour of the sky and the sea at the same time. Someone who had let John kiss him a week before.

John closed his eyes, a heavy, suffocating weight crashing him down, sucking all the air from his lungs. John screamed. He screamed for what he thought were hours. He screamed until his voice was hoarse and someone finally heard him, forcing him to run away. And oh, how John ran. It was glorious. His legs ached, his heart beat furiously against his ribcage, his lungs were burning, his teeth hurting. And still he ran. He didn’t know where his legs were bringing him, but when he saw Sherlock Holmes’s house in front of his eyes, he knew it couldn’t be anywhere else.

He circled the building, and before he could talk himself out of it, he climbed the tree in front of Sherlock’s room. When he reached the younger boy’s window, he peered inside. Sherlock was awake, sitting cross-legged on his bed. He was chewing on his pen, as he worked on a textbook opened on his lap. Just seeing him, so real and so just  _there_ , made John’s heartbeat falter. He knocked on the glass. Sherlock’s expression was of pure bewilderment. But the boy scrambled to his feet anyway, his mouth slack open in shock, his eyebrows high on his forehead. He was beautiful, and John mentally slapped himself for even  _thinking_  that. There was definitely something wrong with him.

As soon as Sherlock opened the window, John rolled inside, still breathing hard from his running. He didn’t want Sherlock to see the bruises he was sure were very much evident by now, but Sherlock kneeled in front of him, calling his name. God, he sounded so worried. John closed his mouth with his hand, told him not to speak. Sherlock’s smell was too strong this close, and his eyes were crinkled with worry, and he was so goddamn beautiful that John couldn’t help but kiss him. Christ, it never felt like this. This was the most soul-wrenching kiss of John’s life. It tore him apart. And it made him angry. Because he was kissing a man, and it should have felt wrong, and disgusting and unnatural. But instead it felt right, and perfect and the most natural thing John had ever done. John hated this, hated it so much he had to bite down on Sherlock’s lip, punish him because why wasn’t he stopping John? But Sherlock hissed in pain, and John was suddenly overcome with guilt and couldn’t stop saying he was sorry. He was also crying. When did he start? John wanted more. He wanted to feel every fibre of Sherlock’s body, wanted to forget his father’s voice in his head, his sister’s tears still drowning his thoughts.

That night John wanked them off on Sherlock’s bed, not at all with finesse or sweetness.

Sherlock wouldn’t shut up, and John  _hated_  him when he told him that he was magnificent. What the fuck did he mean? How was John magnificent? He was a fucking disaster. He got off on having fights in pubs and doing dangerous shit just for the rush of adrenaline. He was the boy who basically killed his own mother, who was hated by his father for this very reason. John hated himself too.

And Sherlock had just called him magnificent? John needed to get the hell out of that room, he couldn’t breathe.

As soon as they were both spent on Sherlock’s ridiculously expensive duvet, John got up, fastening his jeans and crossing the room to the window.

“Wait!” Sherlock’s desperate voice stopped him in his track. He waited for the other boy to say something, but Sherlock stayed silent. Perfect. It didn’t mean anything to him too then. He left.

 

 

“Watson?” the bored voice of a guard calls. John’s head snaps towards the sound.

“Someone’s here for ya,” the guard finishes, opening the door. John stares at the fat man in shock. Who could come get him out if his sister is unavailable? He gets up with eagerness, almost running out of the cell.

The guard scoffs, “Impatient, uh?”

John refrains from flipping the man off, and clenches his fists, following him. When they turn the corner, John stops dead. There, beside his few personal effects, there’s Sherlock Holmes. His arms are crossed on his chest, and he looks annoyed, but John can’t help but think that he looks adorable. Adorable,  _adorable_? What the fuck is wrong with him? He scowls at Sherlock, because he can’t scowl at himself, and walks to retrieve his personal belongings.

“What the fuck are you doing here Holmes,” he grumbles, as he signs the paper.

John thinks that Sherlock’s face looks a bit crestfallen, and he ignores the pang of guilt that hits him. The only person he has ever cared about is his sister, and just that has got him only bruises and cuts. And now she is gone, and it isn’t like she’s keeping in touch with the person who got all her beatings for eighteen bloody years. Caring about other people’s feelings has proven to be a really fucking stupid thing to do, so John avoids it, if possible. He relies on his mates for a laugh and a pint, on Mary for a shelter when things get bad and that’s that. All these people are replaceable, useful just for what they can offer.

Sherlock, on the other hand. What can Sherlock give John? It’s not just the shagging, though that is absolutely brilliant.

No, it’s not just the shagging, John could have that anywhere. He doesn’t know what’s about Holmes that’s different. John always feels both completely himself when he’s with the other boy, but also like he cannot absolutely show him how he truly feels. In the end, Holmes never seemed to mind when John behaved like a rude bastard. Perhaps he wouldn’t even like another version of John.

“I-I just bailed you out. It would be obvious even to a monkey, John.”

John hides his smirk. He  _loves_  when Sherlock behaves like a tough guy, puffing his chest out and lifting his chin. He doesn’t fool anyone.

“Yeah, whatever. They couldn’t hold me more than 24 hours, so it’s not like you saved me much time.”

John takes his stuff from the guard’s hands, stuffing his wallet in a pocket, his phone in another. His jacket got lost in the fight, he notices. Who cares, it was a shitty jacket anyway.

John and Sherlock exit the prison together, and John is momentarily blinded by the sunlight.

“Christ,” he murmurs, shielding his eyes. Sherlock hesitates at his side. John sighs, “The fuck do you want Holmes? A thank you? Alright, thank you for getting me out. Here, there you have it. See you at school, and if someone asks you, you didn’t even know I was here. You haven’t come to my rescue, understood?”

Sherlock bows his head, stuffing his hands in his pockets.

“I thought it would be different,” he murmurs. John frowns, “Uh?”

Sherlock peers at him through the hair that falls on his forehead, biting down on his lip. He looks so much younger than John right now, you would never tell he’s only one year his junior.

“The other night,” he says, and John freezes, “I thought that things had changed after the other night. I- I mean, we had breakfast together and you met my family, and we went to school together and... I was wrong, it seems.”

John crosses his arms on his chest, “About what?”

Sherlock smiles, but it’s so sad a smile, and his eyes are filled with tears. John tears his gaze away. He hears Sherlock sigh sadly, “About you. Nothing changed. You’re still you and I’m still me.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” John bites out, still looking everywhere but Sherlock’s eyes.

“It means my window stays shut,” Sherlock says, and before John can stop him, he’s running away. Not that John would want to stop him. The fuck does he care. Fine, he can go fuck Jeanette Williams, who’s always free for a quick shag in the school’s bathrooms on her couch when her parents are out.

John kicks an empty litter on the ground, pleased when a car passes with its wheel on it, smashing it. He pretends it’s not a perfect metaphor of his heart.

 

 

Four days later, John is moping around. There’s a terrifyingly painful hole in his chest, and every second that passes it grows wider and wider. John thinks that it’s a similar pain to when his father had kicked him in the stomach with his new boots, the ones with an iron point. It burns and it hurts at the same time, and it’s constant.

It’s there when he wakes up and when he has breakfast, still half asleep.

It grows in intensity when he’s at school, and Sherlock is everywhere. In every corridor, in every classroom, in every microscope, in all the people he meets.

It becomes almost unbearable when he  _actually_  sees Sherlock, and the boy either looks at him sadly or ignores John completely.

It’s definitely, incredibly, desperately unbearable when he has to pretend he’s having fun while his mates shove Sherlock against a locker or smash his lunch on the ground.

It becomes a dull ache when he’s at home, drinking beer or watching tv, and he can’t stop seeing stupid, sad blue eyes in front of his face.

On the fifth day, John is sure he’ll die of the pain. Turner has just written the word ‘fag’ on all of Sherlock’s belongings, along with a few ‘freak’ and ‘poof’. All his mates are snickering as Turner writes on Sherlock’s locker, on his books, on the other stuff he had left in the (only apparent) security of his locker. John does nothing. He stands there, watching in silence. He can’t tell them to stop. If he does, he’ll have to give reasons that won’t make him sound like a pussy. So stuff like, “Because he’s a better person than you could ever be,” or “Because I care about him,” is to be ruled out.

Suddenly Sherlock is there, staring at the group in front his locker from the end of the corridor. Well, to be precise, he’s looking at John, only John, and his expression breaks him. It just does. Every person has a breaking point, and apparently John’s is five days without Sherlock Holmes and the look that the boy is giving him in this very moment.

John runs away. God, that’s such a coward move, but he runs. That’s what he does, doesn’t he? Ever since he was born.

 

 

His aunt had always told him that it wasn’t his and Harry’s fault. That she loved them, and that it wasn’t (“Look at me John, I’m serious”) their fault.

John’s mother had always been a petite, fragile woman. She was (apparently, John had never met her) kind and too naïve for her own good. She thought love could change a person, that love was the answer. So when her high school boyfriend started to drink, she just loved him more. She got pregnant a few months after the wedding, a rushed business in an little church. They were both only twenty-one.

She was weak, and delicate and just... breakable. Two children were too many for her. She died giving birth.

John’s father hated Harry and John. He despised his children, who took his wife from him. He drank more. He forgot to feed and change the twins for days, until his sister-in-law came to the rescue. She kept Harry and John with her until they were five. That was when she met an American man, and decided to move to Atlanta with him, leaving her niece and nephew behind. John had always thought she loved them. It was hard realising she never really did.

 

 

John runs. He runs away from his guilt for having killed his mother.

He runs away from his aunt, who left them without more than a week notice.

He runs away from his father, physical manifestation of his self-hate and all his fears.

He runs away from Sherlock, because he might have been the answer, and now he is no more.

Because Sherlock is gone. John had him, John cradled him in his arms, John kissed him and fucked him and now Sherlock is gone. He can’t get Sherlock back. It took him five bloody days to realise that he can’t live without Sherlock Holmes, that the air seems thicker and gravity stronger, pulling him down, down. John pushes aside one of the janitors, and runs out of the school, away, on the street. Sherlock was  _there_ , and he was  _his_ , and he loved him, he loved  _John_ , no matter how broken he was, Sherlock had loved him. But Sherlock saw him there with his mates, and he had looked at John with  _that_  expression. There was no love in it.

Suddenly, John realises he’s not breathing. He tries to inhale some air, but it travels too far in his lungs, and he cannot stop. He breathes in again, and the air goes in too deeply again. His breaths become faster and faster, too fast, too deep, he cannot even  _feel_  the air doing its job, it’s not working, he can’t breathe, he can’t breathe, he can’t breathe–

Then, arms are on him, and someone is dragging him in the shadows, sitting him down on the concrete. John doesn’t see who is manhandling him around like a fucking toddler, but he doesn’t care because can’t they see he cannot breathe, and that Sherlock is gone?

“Shh, I know it’s hard, just try to slow down your breaths.”

“Stay calm, everything is fine.”

“Who’s gone?”

John hears the voice as if it comes from a dream, and maybe it does. Perhaps he’s dying, people who can’t breathe usually die.

“Oh, silly, you’re not dying. C’mon love, breathe for me.”

John can’t, can’t,  _can’t_ , for the love of God, take in a breath that doesn’t dissolve in sobs or loud gasps.

But now those same arms that have dragged him away from the street are hugging him, and their owner smells of soap and lavender. John starts to calm down, and only then tears start to fall. He doesn’t remember the last time he has received a hug. Perhaps he never has.

“Do you feel better, love?” the voice asks, and finally John can see the face that belongs to the voice. It’s a little old lady, with kind, brown eyes and a fond smile. John is still a bit shaken to be honest, and he grips the old woman’s arms, not even thinking that he might be hurting her. She doesn’t seem to mind. But why is she smiling? Doesn’t she know that Sherlock’s gone?

The old woman smiles sadly, “Has your boyfriend left you?” she asks, and John shakes his head, forcefully. Boyfriend? Sherlock? John is not gay, he doesn’t do ‘boyfriends’. Sherlock was just for fun. And now he left. Oh, God, he really has left, fuck, no, no, no–

“Shh love, calm down, I’m sorry, wrong question. Why don’t we sit on that bench and have a talk?”

John doesn’t remember nodding, but ten minutes later he’s sitting on a bench with an ice-cream he has no intention to eat in his hand.

The old woman is a surprisingly good conversationalist, filling in all John’s silences. John feels like a toddler again, what with the bloody ice-cream, but he can’t be arsed to care.

“If you want to tell me what happened, feel free to. Just to let things off your chest, you know? It’s good doing that with a stranger,” the old woman says, startling John out of his thoughts. Wasn’t she talking about Marie from the knitting club?

“I, well, I don’t have much to say. I’m a fucking asshole. I went to this loser’s house for a chemistry project and then we started to fuck, and he said he loves me but I’m not gay, and now he said that he thought things would change after a week ago, because I told him that I wasn’t shagging him just for fun, but I have behaved like an asshole  _again_ and he went away, oh my God, he really did, didn’t he?”

John doesn’t know at which part of his speech he has started to cry, or when the little old lady has taken him in her arms again. He doesn’t even know why he told her all this stuff, or why he used so many swearwords in front of this kind, old woman. But she’s still holding him, and he doesn’t deserve that, he’s not a good person. He’s not that kind of person that deserves to be helped by little old women who smell like soap and lavender, he doesn’t deserve to be loved by someone as clever and funny and beautiful and extraordinary as Sherlock Holmes.

He draws away from the woman.

“It’s alright, really. I mean, he was too good for me anyway, and I have treated him like shit. Also, my father would have probably killed me if he’d found out, so. It’s for the best,” he attempts to smile, only managing to make more tears fall from his eyes. The old woman is on the verge of tears too, and she holds his hand with a death grip.

“If you didn’t deserve him, you wouldn’t have realised you weren’t treating him right.”

John huffs out a bitter laugh, “I don’t think you understand.”

The little old lady glares at him, “Oh, I do, I very much do. Now, stop fustigating yourself and go get him back, but this time do things slowly; go out on a date, hold hands, share a first kiss in front of his house. Let him fall in love with you again, show him how much you love him too.”

John tries to swallow the lump in his throat, to no success, and shakes his head.

“I’m not gay,” he says.

“I’m not gay either, and I’m married with a woman,” the little lady whispers, holding up her hand, on which a silver band shines.

“What... How...” John gapes at her, and she smiles softly.

“Do you think my family approved when I told them I was going to spend the rest of my life with a woman? Do you think that, back in the 70s, it was easy for them, and especially for me, to accept, to  _understand_? But in the end, nothing mattered, just that I loved Susan.”

The old lady shakes her head, smiling as she remembers. “We have been together since 1969, and I was only 24. I had a boyfriend at the time, and I used to sneak away from our dates to meet Susan. I really thought I was just going through an odd phase, that in a few years I would be a happily married woman with kids.”

The woman plays with her wedding ring, smiling absent-mindedly, “But I loved Susan, and I still love her and it hasn’t passed a day that I regretted all I did for her.”

“Wh-what did you do for her?” John asks, his voice a low whisper.

“Well, many many things, but just about the beginning of our relationship, acknowledging the fact that I was behaving, as you said, like an asshole, leaving Tom and moving in with Susan. Best decisions I have ever made.”

“But... You said that you’re not gay.”

The old woman laughs, “I think you’ll find the word ‘bisexual’ useful.”

John’s head is spinning, and he feels like there’s a gaping hole beneath his feet. Fuck, he’s scared as hell. Of what, precisely, he has no idea.

“So what, should I go beg on my knees like some bitch?”

The woman flinches a little, and John mutters an apology for his language. Not that it bothered her up until now.

“If you love him, and I believe you do, yes, you should.”

Then she gets up, saying that she’s late for bingo, and that if she comes home late again Susan will kill her.

She kisses John’s cheek, telling him to take care of himself. She also stuffs a piece of paper in his hand, saying, “Call me if you need to talk.”

Then she runs down the street, hurrying to get to her friends.

 

 

John can perfectly remember the first time he went to Sherlock’s house. It was for that stupid chemistry project, and John had reluctantly asked Sherlock’s number and address at the end of the lessons, telling him he’d be there after practice. John endured his teammates’ teasing, all “The  _freak_ , John, seriously?” and “Be careful John, that one’s a poof!”

He arrived at the boy’s house as late as he could, ready to frighten Sherlock in doing all the work for him. But Sherlock was... John doesn’t even know what it was that made him laugh at Sherlock’s joke about the mud still in his hair. From there, it was like being with someone he had known his whole life. Sherlock offered him biscuits and tea, explained him stuff he still hadn’t quite grasped and showed him experiments he had already made (when he was about 10) and that were similar to what the teacher had asked. Sherlock was fucking clever, John realised. Not just ‘freak’ clever, but seriously, undeniably brilliant. John told him a couple of times, and Sherlock blushed so hard John feared the teen risked to self-combust. Then Sherlock’s mom came back from the university where she teaches, and asked John if he wanted to stay for dinner. She looked sweet and maternal and loving and John couldn’t breathe.

He ran away.

The second time he came back, he and Sherlock sipped orange juice in the backyard while fighting over their project. The previous meeting they had revised, and now they couldn’t agree on which experiment to perform. Sherlock wanted to do something overly complicated which would probably explode, while John insisted on doing something simple, like slime of some sort of polymer. In the end, they settled on doing an experiment that involved redox reactions (so John could revise them) and that caused some kind of explosion (which Sherlock adored). Building an ammonium dichromate volcano was a simple business, and after the first, successful try, they flopped on the couch to watch some telly. In the dim light of the living room, Sherlock’s face looked ethereal. That was the first time John thought of kissing him. But he couldn’t.

He ran away.

The third time he went to Sherlock’s house, he and the other boy lay down on their bellies, doing some homework together before revising the goddamn redox reactions that John really couldn’t bring himself to understand. And Sherlock was so beautiful, talking excitedly about that boring stuff, showing John image after image, and his face looked so much younger, open with wonder. This time, John couldn’t resist. He kissed him. He kissed Sherlock Holmes, the guy who lit up like a fucking Christmas tree for chemistry. The strange kid who read gruesome criminology textbooks during lessons. The weird boy who spent lunch alone. The most magnificent human being John had ever met.

The most amazing thing though wasn’t that John had worked up the courage to make such a move – oh no. The most amazing thing was that Sherlock was kissing him back. The kiss lasted long seconds, and John was completely lost in it. His mind stopped working, and for a moment, John forgot that he was a goddamn walking disaster.

Suddenly, just as his tongue was caressing Sherlock’s lower lip, John came back to his senses. What the hell was he thinking? He was going nuts. And fuck, what the- no. He panicked.

He ran away.

 

 

When he arrives in front of Sherlock’s house that late afternoon, John’s lungs are on fire. And that’s the sensation he loves the most. That’s the sensation that gives him the nerve to knock on the bloody door.

It’s not Sherlock who opens, but a tall man with auburn hair and a long nose.

“Yes?” he asks, staring down at John.

“I’m-I’m John- John Watson,” he replies, drawing shallow breaths in his burning lungs.

“Mycroft!” Sherlock’s voice calls from somewhere within the house, and John flinches, just hearing the boy’s baritone. The man in the doorway looks at him curiously then, but before he can ask John anything, Sherlock has gripped his arm and is pulling him away.

“Fuck off,” Sherlock whispers, and the man nods, looks at John one last time, then disappears.

Seeing Sherlock is enough to make John’s heart beat faster and faster, and his stomach sinks.

Sherlock stares at him blankly, then, wordlessly, he shuts the door in John’s face. In a fast movement, John’s foot prevents the door from closing, his hands slamming flat on the wood.

“Please,” he murmurs, “Please, just give me one minute.”

Sherlock hesitates, and those are the most tense moments in John’s life. The door slowly opens again, Sherlock’s face defeated.

“One minute,” he breathes, looking anywhere but John.

While running to Sherlock, John prepared a good speech. Long, and elaborated. He thought of telling him that he wanted to try again, to please forgive him and see if they could build something together. Go on dates and hold hands and all that shit the kind old lady told him.

But having Sherlock in front of him, so broken and defeated,  _because of him_ , John knows he doesn’t deserve to be forgiven.

“I’m sorry,” he starts, and Sherlock huffs a sad laugh. It hits John like a blow in the solar plexus.

“About what?” Sherlock spits out, still staring at the ground. Then his eyes meet John and Christ – he looks bloody furious.

“About leaving me every night after we fucked as though you were ashamed? About ignoring me every single day until you fancied a quickie? About watching as your friends beat me and made my life a living hell? About running away today and let them destroy my belongings and humiliate me in front the whole school? Or are you just  _generally_  sorry, about running away every single fucking time?”

Sherlock is screaming, and a little part of John’s brain is worried his family inside might hear him. The rest is yelling as well, because Sherlock is crying,  _again_ , and Sherlock’s voice and expression are of pure and bare and raw  _pain_ , all because of John.

“I... I have been running for my whole life, that’s what I do. I run away, Sherlock. Because I’m a coward.”

Every word scratches John’s oesophagus like sandpaper, but he goes on.

“This is the first time I have ever run  _to_  something. Or better, to someone. I have run to you, because I’m sorry and I know I was wrong and I do not deserve someone like you. And-”

John blinks back his tears, choking on the last words.

“And I wanted to tell you that you’re amazing. That I was an asshole, and that has nothing to do with you. My aunt used to tell me that my mom felt guilty when my father started to drink. That she thought it was her fault, and she took the blame for every slap and every insult. But it wasn’t her fault, it was my dad’s, who is a fucking asshole. I spent my whole life hating him and now I find out... I’m just the same. I know you’ll probably insult me for saying this, but I need-”

John draws in a sharp breath, “It’s not your fault. I’m the problem, I mean, you could have a healthy relationship with anyone, you’re great, Sherlock. You deserve someone better than me, and I wish you’ll find that person.”

John peers up at Sherlock’s eyes, “Thank you, for giving yourself to me even though I didn’t deserve you.”

He smiles sadly, turning his back to Sherlock before he bursts into tears in front of him.

“I’m baking biscuits.” John’s head snaps up, and he twirls around to gape at Sherlock.

The boy is still avoiding his eyes, but he repeats, “I’m baking biscuits, for my mom’s birthday. If you want to help.”

Then Sherlock disappears inside the house, leaving the door open, a silent invitation for John.

John needs to run away. Because it could end badly. Entering that house would mean he’d have to expose himself, risking to lose everything.

John needs to run away. Because you can’t be disappointed if you don’t expect anything.

John needs to run away. He can feel the physical need in his soles, in the tension of his muscles.

He takes a deep breath, swallowing the lump in his throat.

He takes a step forward.

He doesn’t run away.

**Author's Note:**

> Title and song in the description, [I Wanna Be Yours](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Jnbg3mHojg) by the Arctic Monkeys.  
> Seriously, I should name this series "this is what happens when you write johnlock and listen to AM", which is funny because AM is not even my favourite Arctic Monkeys album (that would be "Whatever people say I am, that's what I'm not", fyi).
> 
>  _Pleaseee_ let me know what you think about this because I was super unsure whether to post it or not. 
> 
> Thank you for reading! :)


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